Asymptotic Wave Functions for Atomic Systems

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Recently approximate ground state solutions to the nonrelativistic Schrodinger equation for many electron atoms have received considerable attention. Electron wave functions giving a reasonably correct description of the electron density throughout configuration space would facilitate calculation of weak interaction effects. Of late, there have been refinements in the experimental measurements of magnetic susceptibility, electric polarizability and quadrupole coupling of atoms. The utilization of more accurate wave functions would allow calculation of these effects to keep pace with experiment. More accurate atomic scattering factors could also be obtained. In addition, if accurate excited state wave functions were known, transition probabilities and optical absorption and inelastic scattering cross-sections could be calculated with much greater precision.